The pain of seeing travel snaps from a home I cannot visit

By Giselle Au-Nhien Nguyen

January 2, 2016 — 8.05pm

It's that time of year when your social media feeds fill with photos of stunning overseas landscapes. Your friends raise their wine glasses; they make peace signs underneath famous monuments; they pose with friendly locals, grins plastered across their faces.

Envy is a normal reaction to such images, or inspiration for future trips. But what about sadness, pain, longing, isolation?

I was born eight years after my parents arrived in Australia as Vietnamese refugees. My father was a medical officer in the South Vietnamese army, spending three years in a concentration camp after the war ended in 1975, and then a further two plotting an escape. My mother was a concert pianist. They fled in a tiny boat in 1980, spending 10 uncertain days at sea as my father mapped their journey by following the stars. Their boat was attacked and pillaged seven times. They were lucky not to die.

Arriving in a strange new land with nothing but the clothes on their backs, my parents built their lives from the ground up. In the 36 years since they fled, they have not been back – despite missing their home deeply, they are steadfast in their conviction that they will not return until the corrupt government that stole their country and freedom is no longer in power. They're getting older now, and the government shows no signs of changing. My greatest fear is that the day they fled was the last time they'll ever see Vietnam.

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Vietnamese was my first language. I call my parents Bố and Mẹ – the Vietnamese words for Dad and Mum – and I observe their traditions, from elaborate Lunar New Year celebrations, to rituals to remember our ancestors. I learned to read and write in Vietnamese as I learned to read and write in English. My heritage shines brightly in every part of my life and yet, due to the circumstances under which my parents left, I've never been to this place that holds all of my history.

I'm often asked why I don't just go back without my parents, if the reason I've never been is because they don't want to. What's stopping me from booking a cheap flight and getting to know the country on my own terms, as many of my friends have? I've considered this myself, but I know it would mean nothing without my parents. I don't want to see it as just another tourist destination, as I embarrass myself to the locals with my garbled Vietnamese. I want it to be special and sacred. I want my parents to show me all the places that meant something to them. I can get wasted on cheap cocktails anywhere in the world; Vietnam means more to me than that.

Sometimes I get angry. I wish I didn't, because I know no one is doing this to hurt me. It's a wonderful thing to travel – to eat amazing food, meet interesting people, experience different cultures and learn more about the world. But I'm angry because it doesn't mean as much to them as it would to me. I'm angry that they don't know how lucky they are. I'm angry when people call it Ho Chi Minh City instead of its real name, Saigon. I'm angry because people brag about how cheap things are over there, when they don't realise the cheapness comes at a price. I'm angry because I know how much my parents miss it, and I know so many people have asked them, too, why they're not over it yet, and why they haven't used their new privilege to go home for a holiday. But how are you meant to get over having everything you loved ripped from your bare hands? I'm angry because I want them to be happy, and I want to be happy, and I can't make it happen. The resentment makes me feel ashamed and irrational, but it manifests itself as a physical ache.

It's a strange feeling to miss something you've never had. When I look at these images, I see places I have never been to, but feel like I intimately know; I taste and smell things that have never even come close to me, but are burned into my senses anyway. I see my mother running barefoot in the coffee plantation her family owned when she was a child. I see my father in camouflage, crouching low, still. I see ghosts. My breath catches, and my throat tightens, and I grieve for a home I have never known.